


night terrors

by bellmare



Category: Dangan Ronpa
Genre: Dangan Ronpa Kink Meme, Gen, PTSD, Post-Canon, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-02
Updated: 2013-05-02
Packaged: 2017-12-10 05:13:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/782197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellmare/pseuds/bellmare
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The road to recovery is paved with night terrors.</p>
            </blockquote>





	night terrors

**Author's Note:**

> Kink meme fill for [this](http://superhighschoollevelsmut.dreamwidth.org/558.html?thread=308526#cmt308526) prompt.
> 
> _The people who survive go on to find out that the Monoworld isn't real, and that the police have been surrounding Hope's Peak in a siege for quite awhile now, and their families are okay and it's seeming all okay- but it's really not._
> 
> _Because how could anyone forget what happened, and how could you forget if you lived it?_
> 
> _(AU where everyone's just shell shocked and everyone has their different reactions- id love to see the kids refusing to be apart because a part of them still thinks they're going to die. PTSD, everyone)_

At first they believe everything Junko said; maybe it's just another one of her tricks, another one of her lies engineered to bring them to their knees.

The door opens a crack. It moves so agonisingly slowly. Naegi doesn't know what to expect. Maybe they'll see a ruined world; maybe they'll see rioters in Monobear masks, waiting to tear them apart. Maybe there'll be nothing left of everything they once knew.

He holds his breath.

.

There are officers, everywhere. Negotiators and paramedics and bomb squads form a swirling tide around the school that rushes forth to engulf them. Naegi glances to his left, sharply and reaches for someone, anyone but their own families have claimed them; they're pulled away from him before he can catch hold of them. Where is everyone, he wants to say, is everyone still here?

His parents and sister are on him in seconds. All around him the scene plays out, fourfold.

Except for Kirigiri. Kirigiri gazes, tight-lipped, at the suit-clad people who mill around her. She stands stock-still as someone that might be her mother embraces her, and says, "father is dead" and nothing else.

.

He's glad. He's so, so glad that they're safe, that everybody is still alive and well. He's so glad it was just a cheap trick to make them want to stay in the school forever.

(Not-so-happy facts, he files away for future reference: Sayaka's public funeral, widely-broadcasted to millions of mourning fans; her friends, he thinks, would never have wanted her to see them like this. He also thinks it's a long time before they can smile again. Online chatrooms and doujin circles hold blackouts of respect for Yamada; Ishimaru's family declines comment; even the criminal undercurrents grind to a momentary halt, to mark the passing of a legendary gang leader and an infamous gambler who robbed them dry more than once. Some nights Naegi stays up until dusk bleeds to dawn, watching endless videos on mute; it's kind of amazing, how people dying really brings a world together.)

.

He meets the others in hospital when they realise they share a ward; he meets the others in therapy sessions, where they arrange themselves in sunlit rooms and try to talk about how they feel. They're quieter, now, humbler in the case of Togami though he denies it. It's just like old times, Naegi thinks. Just like old times.

They sit in a quiet circle on hours on end; they make small talk, inquiring about one another's lives. Togami haughtily reassures them he's doing well, and nobody mentions hearing him jolt awake cursing under his breath. Nobody mentions knowing everybody else lies awake in their beds for hours on end staring at the ceiling. Nobody mentions listening to Asahina crying herself to sleep every night; nobody mentions Hagakure's jumpiness or the way he starts shaking and thinks nobody else notices, whenever somebody walks past their ward. Nobody questions Fukawa's silence or Kirigiri's withdrawal into herself, as she pads to the window every night and stares out into the night sky as though she can track the trajectory her father's rocketship took through space.

.

He doesn't go back to school. How can he go back to school, so soon after leaving a living hell, he wants to say. But everybody understands. Nobody makes them return, because who would be that cruel? 

It's been a long time since he's left the house. One day, he'll do it, he tells himself. One day he'll go out grocery-shopping and meet up with the others. One day he won't wake up feeling like he's drowning in blood and lymph; one day he'll be able to go somewhere without looking over his shoulder, watching for a girl with a devil's smile who promises of more despair to come.

.

The therapists (not of the super high school level persuasion, thank the gods for small mercies, he thinks with relief) encourage him to reconnect with the world. Reaching out is the first step of recovery, they tell him.

"At least they have something right," Kirigiri says drily. Naegi mumbles something incomprehensible into the mouthpiece and she hums in response. They don't need to say anything. They've not needed to say anything, since they left school. Since graduation. Since all those nights when they sat together playing cards at four in the morning on someone's too-thin hospital bed, the springs creaking beneath the weight of six haunted teenagers. That was the first time they'd smiled for a while, he thinks fondly, when Hagakure had attempted to divine their future using a normal deck of playing cards. He'd lobbed the ace of hearts at Togami and Fukawa with a giddy laugh, and tucked the queen of diamonds behind Asahina's ear.  _Good tidings for the future_ , he'd said in a deep and too-sombre voice before dissolving into a fit of hysterical giggles and nobody, not even Togami, had had the heart to tell him to shut up.

"It's getting late," Kirigiri's saying. Naegi nods and remembers she can't see him through the phone. "Goodnight then, Kirigiri-san, and remember to take your sleeping tablets," he says instead. She laughs softly when he adds, "... but not too much."

"You too, Naegi-kun," she says and hangs up.

.

Naegi stands under the shower spray for ten whole minutes before he realises he's been there for so long. Closing his eyes doesn't help because when he does he can still see Sayaka's body sprawled by his ankles, her blood spiralling down the plughole. He scrubs desperately at the  _11037_  on the wall but no matter what he does, no matter how much soap he uses, it never comes off. He asked his parents if they redecorated sometime ago but they say no and exchange worried glances. He doesn't tell them about the blood slick on the tiles or splashed across the glass; he doesn't tell them about the upside-down writing on the walls.

Nobody knocks at the door any more. They've stopped, after he took to wedging it shut every time he goes into the washroom.

.

He dreams so much, nowadays. Strange, that he didn't dream much when he was in Hope's Peak. Maybe it's a delayed reaction. His composure doesn't hold very well nowadays, not like it used to during trials where he was condemning his friends. Not like it used to when he bent to inspect their corpses, and could resist the urge to dry-heave all over his shoes.

Sometimes he sees Ishimaru and Yamada slumped on his bedroom floor, their hair matted with blood. Oh, god, he can see the shiny glint of cranial bones through the bruised skin of their scalps. They're looking at him with bloodshot eyes, the capillaries ruptured from internal pressure. When he turns towards the wall and stares out of the window he sees Celestia going up in flames, hands clasped in prayer as a fire engine roars towards her. Sometimes he hears sirens, too, and he isn't sure whether they're from his memories or whether they're real, whether there's yet another tragedy that has cropped up.

He can't listen to music any more, not when he can hear Leon and Sayaka singing along to the rock anthems and pop ballads on the radio. He throws out every single one of his discs and clears his music library and listens to silence, all day long.

.

Hagakure texts him every day with dumb trivia, silly snippets of information like,  _naegi-chi do u know ur stomach produces a new layer of like stomach goo stuff every 2 weeks bc it woudl digest itself otherwise_  and  _naegi-chi omg there are more chickens than ppl in the world!!!!!!_

_That's great,_  Naegi texts back.

_i miss everyone : (_  Hagakure types.  _even the ogre ...... 2day i went to the shrine and rang some bells 4 her n stuff ....... its the least i can do u kno?? maybe ill dream about her spirit tonight and she'll tell me shes at rest or sumthing i hope and mayb challenging the heavenly kings 2 duels ..... maybe one day we should hold a ....... u kno like a um wat do u call it a séance???  like mayyb itd help asahina-chi feel better if she can talk to ogr ...... uh oogami-chi_

_That's great,_  Naegi types again and then adds,  _good for you. Maybe another time, though. About the s_ _é_ _ance, I mean, now's not the best timing._

_hmm yea good point .......... hey naegi-chi tell u wat do u want me 2 giv u a free tarot reding and divine ur future and maybe read ur palm all 4 free_

_Um ... maybe I'll pass,_  he replies.

_o also apparently the avrage person falls asleep in 7mins_

Naegi stares at his phone for a long, long time until it buzzes again, in his hand.

_tho i think as u'd say U GOT THAT WRONG bc it takes me more lik 7hrs to sleep now : ( how can my mind be in tiptop shape to catch good auras like this?????_

_You and me both,_  Naegi types back.

.

That night he pokes through dinner and his chopsticks remind him of the spears that ran through Mukuro Ikusaba's body. His parents don't say anything when he excuses himself and goes to throw up until he feels like he's got nothing left inside.

.

One afternoon, he opens the door to Kirigiri on his doorstep. He admires her and how strong she is, how good at controlling her emotions she is. "We're going out, Naegi-kun," she says without preamble and only lets go of his wrist long enough for him to get properly dressed.

"What's the occasion?" he asks.

"Fukawa-san's memoir came out today," she replies. "We're getting special signed copies."

"Oh," he says and trudges after her, listening to the snow crunching underfoot. It sounds a lot like bones breaking, doesn't it. "That's nice of her."

.

That day at the bookshop is the first time they've met in months. Hagakure scrubs him fondly across the head and gifts him a crystal ball "to commemorate the occasion with". Togami nods soberly at them and silently produces a box of doughnuts for Asahina -- and what looks like a card for a lifetime's supply of free doughnuts wherever she wants -- though not before demanding they start attending therapy sessions again because it's "his job as a pillar of society to ensure the well-being of the proletariat, what will you hoi-polloi do without me, I'll never know".

"You could just say you missed us," Naegi says and Togami shoots him a withering look. It's strange, how much he's missed that glare that could curdle milk and boil lava. He thinks about telling Togami that but decides against it, at least for today.

It's just like old times, he thinks, as they all try to squeeze through the bookstore's door at once and nearly get stuck in the frame. Just like old times, he thinks, when Kirigiri tells him about a job proposal they've been offered, as survivors and graduates of Hope's Peak Academy.

**Author's Note:**

> super quick thing i wrote blah blah blah and super quick de-anon bc i want to sleep


End file.
